Though Gazette vice-president Bernard Asselin described copy editing as a “technical” function, copy editors deal with countless aspects of editorial content that reflect local values. They write headlines, layout pages, choose wire stories, liaise with reporters, and most importantly edit articles to fix mistakes and match editorial policies of the newspaper.

Canwest wishes to replace Gazette copy editors by non-unionized workers at Canwest Editorial Services in Hamilton, Ont., who are not trained on the newspaper’s style guide, are not kept up to speed on design changes, and are not familiar with Montreal’s unique culture. (In December, they misspelled the name of Claude Lamoureux, the former president of the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, in a feature headline. Gazette editors were powerless to fix the mistake, which appeared in special Canwest-produced Financial Post pages which local papers are being forced to insert into their business sections.)

Despite Canwest’s claims that this outsourcing is done in the name of efficiency and centralization, the true purpose is to replace unionized professionals in Montreal with cheaper, nonunionized, untrained staff in Hamilton.

One of the functions that copy editors perform is to adapt stories from other sources (such as news wires) to meet the specific needs of the newspaper. At a basic level, that means editing for style and cutting to fit the space available. But it can also involve editing more than one story together, inserting copy provided by local journalists, or adding or highlighting information of local interest. With the outsourcing of editorial work to CES, this process fails.

An example of this failure is in Monday’s Driving section (the Driving section is entirely produced by CES; Gazette editors have no control over its content, headlines, photos or layout). An article originally written for the National Post appears on Page C5 that gives Gazette readers the impression that winter tires are optional:

Obviously, one of the key factors in the equipment category is tires. While the value of using snow tires has been described often on these pages, the supply shortage this winter is forcing many drivers to make do with all-season tires. If you’re stuck having to use the all-season tread, the best advice is to remember that a half-worn all-season tire is the equivalent of a summer tire, and summer tires shouldn’t be used on snow.

If the tread depth on your all-seasons is half gone and winter tires are not available, Cox says you’d be better off getting a replacement set of all-seasons.

“The performance of all-season tires is dramatically reduced compared with winter tires, but if there is no alternative, the deeper the tread the better.

“However, the all-season tire’s rubber compound still can’t cope with lower temperatures, so you should dial back your driving to suit the road conditions. Remember to respect the limits of all-season tires.”

Cox likens the year-round use of all-season tires to wearing tennis shoes every day. “They’ll get the job done, but you’re more comfortable with sandals in the summer and snow boots in winter. You get better performance, comfort and safety.”

At no point does the article mention that winter tires are required by law in Quebec and that drivers with all-season tires in winter face fines of $200-$300.

This is not a “technical” error. It is misinformation being given to Gazette readers that is a direct and foreseeable result of the outsourcing of work outside Quebec.

This is only the beginning. So far, the Driving section is the only one being entirely produced outside The Gazette. If Canwest continues on the path of outsourcing the editorial production of the newspaper, how much more bad information will begin appearing in The Gazette?

Sign our petition, and tell The Gazette that you want your newspaper produced in Montreal, not in southern Ontario.

On Wednesday, Gazette Publisher Alan Allnutt sent the following letter to employees:

To All Gazette Employees:

On Jan. 14 the company tabled final contract proposals to the Guild. Last Sunday the Guild submitted the proposals to its members. The advertising unit accepted it, while editorial and RSS units turned it down. At the same time, those units instructed their negotiating committee in a resolution to return to the table to try and resolve the jurisdiction issue in a way “that meets the needs of both the Gazette and its employees.”

This afternoon (Jan. 28) the two sides met in the presence of a conciliator. The Guild presented a proposal on jurisdiction that unfortunately does not meet the needs of the company. In addition, the Guild proposed reopening many other issues that the company considers closed under its final offer. The company told the Guild that it remains open to other proposals on jurisdiction that would satisfy both parties. We remain hopeful that a resolution on this issue can be reached.

Sincerely,

Alan Allnutt

Publisher and General Manager

UPDATE: A response from the bargaining committee:

Clarification

While it is not our intention to bargain by bulletin we wish to clarify statements made by the Publisher in an e-mail to all employees yesterday.

On Sunday, the members in Editorial and RSS voted to reject the Company’s “final offer” and adopted a resolution mandating the bargaining committee to resume negotiations for a fair contract. Your message was loud and clear: negotiate a deal that will resolve jurisdiction and all outstanding issues to conclude a fair agreement.

At yesterday’s meeting before a conciliator the Guild made proposals on all outstanding issues which included movement on most. Contrary to the impression left by the Publisher’s statement, the outstanding issues are not “closed” and remain to be negotiated. Among the proposals yesterday were several that agreed with the company’s latest proposals.

We have committed to bargaining in good faith and expect the company to act in the same manner. We have given the company a counter proposal and it is now up to them to provide us with a counter offer.

Your Bargaining Committee

In meetings Sunday, two bargaining units of the Montreal Newspaper Guild rejected a contract offer presented by The Gazette, while a third accepted an offer for a two-year contract.

A resolution passed by members of the Montreal Newspaper Guild (MNG) instructing their bargaining team to meet with the employer and achieve an agreement was sent to the conciliator, who won the company’s approval to set up a meeting for this Wednesday.

David Wilson, the CWA Canada staff representative who has been leading the negotiations, says of the membership: “They’re pumped!” He notes that “this is the furthest this Local has ever gone in standing up for itself — and they mean it.”

The 181 employees in three bargaining units — Advertising, Editorial and Reader Sales & Service (RSS) — have been without a contract since June 1, 2008. Sunday afternoon, Editorial voted 80.5 per cent and RSS 73 per cent, to reject the company’s offer. Later in the day, Advertising voted 65 per cent in favour of accepting the deal.

The lobby of the hotel where the MNG meetings and votes took place was jammed with journalists from every news outlet in the city, says Wilson. Labour strife in the media had hit the headlines a day earlier, when the Quebecor-owned Journal de Montréal locked out 250 editorial and office employees.

Although both sides at The Gazette have been in a legal strike/lockout position since early last summer, and the union voted 86 per cent in favour of a strike mandate in September, “We’ve told the employer and the public that we have no intention of striking at this time,” says Wilson. “We hope to conclude a fair agreement at some point in the near future.”

Management at the CanWest-owned daily wants language removed from the three collective agreements that gives the MNG jurisdiction over work performed by its members. Without that language, the company would be free to ship the employees’ work to other company facilities that are not unionized.

Guild jurisdiction has been a critical issue ever since Gazette management laid off 45 RSS employees in June and exported their work to a CanWest call centre in Winnipeg.

The MNG is also grieving the transfer of other work — layout of some pages and the Driving section, electronic photo desk functions, business office duties — to non-unionized CanWest facilities in Hamilton and Winnipeg. That grievance is scheduled to go to arbitration next month.

The MNG maintains that contracts for all three bargaining units “clearly prohibit the assignment of such work either to employees of the same employer not covered by our collective agreement or to employees outside The Gazette.”

Meanwhile, an online petition against CanWest’s job outsourcing that was set up in October, had garnered 7,152 signatures as of today.

Vote results

• Editorial: For 23, Against 95
• Reader Sales and Service: For 4, Against 11
• Advertising: For 17, Against 9

Motion passed by Editorial/RSS

Whereas the contract language proposed by Gazette management would lead to widespread outsourcing of our work and significant loss of jobs;

Therefore, be it resolved that we instruct the Guild’s bargaining committee to resume negotiations in good faith with the goal of reaching an agreement that meets the needs of both the Gazette and its employees.

Editorial and Reader Sales and Service bargaining units

We think Montrealers deserve a newspaper created by Montrealers who know and love the city.

Canwest is already laying out some Gazette pages and writing some headlines in Hamilton, Ont. Next it would want to outsource the editing of the articles on those pages to Hamilton.

And after that? 

Would you believe having a reporter covering Montreal city politics from another part of Canada? 

That’s just the scenario that emerged when Bernard Asselin, The Gazette’s vice president of marketing and reader sales, was interviewed by Mike Finnerty on Daybreak, CBC Radio’s Montreal morning show.

Asselin was asked what types of Gazette jobs Canwest wants to ship to other parts of Canada.

Asselin: It’s not someone from outside the province going to city hall to cover Mayor Tremblay’s press conference

Finnerty: That’s not going to happen?

Asselin: Well, not at this point. This is the core product

Finnerty: Not at this point or not ever?

Asselin: Not at this point but you know what, the busines model is broken right now in the newspaper industry. … We need to look at all the options and be flexible. 

Click here to listen to the entire Jan. 27 interview, as well as an interview with Guild representative Irwin Block.

At a meeting yesterday, with publisher Alan Allnutt, the Montreal Newspaper Guild agreed to present the company’s latest contract proposals on Sunday, for a vote.

As a result, the General Membership meeting has been postponed, and in its place, two unit meetings will be held:

Main Unit: 11 a.m.

Advertising: 1 p.m.

Intercontinental Hotel, 360 St. Antoine West, Old Montreal (St. Antoine entrance)

Despite constantly claiming the need to reduce costs by cutting down on the amount of space devoted to news and information, The Gazette somehow managed to save space for four full-page excerpts (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) from a book about Canwest Global founder Izzy Asper this week, representing over 6,200 words. This does not include a 1,200-word review of the book which dismisses the fact that it was paid for and pre-screened by the Asper Foundation and Asper’s wife.

Since these excerpts appeared in newspapers across the Canwest chain, it seems clear once again that The Gazette exercised no editorial control and that this content was forced upon The Gazette by its Winnipeg-based owners, Asper’s sons, Leonard and David.

Do you believe The Gazette should control what appears in its own newspaper? Take action and keep The Gazette in Montreal.

The Montreal Newspaper Guild has been contacted by the conciliator and both sides have agreed to meet on Jan. 7 and Jan. 8, 2009. As a result, journalists have ceased their byline strike and photos and articles created by Gazette journalists once again have their names attached. This is done as a show of good faith on behalf of Gazette workers, and the byline strike may return if it becomes necessary.

The work-to-rule campaign remains in effect.

Beyond the bargaining meeting in January, the guild is also awaiting an arbitration hearing Feb. 19 to deal with the outsourcing of editorial pages to Canwest Editorial Services in Hamilton, Ont. If the guild is successful at proving that the move violates the current contract, all work that has been outsourced will return to the Gazette and be done by Gazette employees in Montreal.

The Guild wishes to thank members of the public that have overwhelmingly supported our cause, and urge them to continue to express their feelings about the deterioration of quality that is a direct result of job cutbacks and outsourcing.

The Ottawa Citizen is refusing to allow its editorial employees to pull their bylines in a show of solidarity with fellow Guild members who are attempting to bargain new contracts at The Gazette in Montreal.

The newspapers are owned by Canwest Global Communications Corp. Guild contracts at both dailies contain clauses that give staff control over their bylines and credit lines.

The Ottawa Newspaper Guild has filed a grievance over management’s position and has no doubt it will win the case, says president Lois Kirkup.

Language in the contract is unequivocal, she notes. The relevant clause states: “Bylines or credit lines shall be used at the Company’s discretion provided that an employee’s byline or credit line shall not be used over his/her protest.”

The employer, says Kirkup, is arguing that pulling bylines and credit lines would hinder production and be a form of strike, which is “nonsense.”

The ONG, which through CWA Canada engaged in co-ordinated mobilization efforts in late summer and early fall when it and the Montreal Newspaper Guild were engaged in bargaining, continues to support the MNG. Although the ONG ratified new collective agreements late last month, the membership has been doing what it can to help colleagues in Montreal.

Kirkup says the Local’s members wore their black Guild T-shirts to a townhall meeting with the publisher in mid-October as well as to work.

“We’re still trying to do things to support Montreal,” says Kirkup.

Financial Post pages in The Gazette

Gazette readers were surprised today to find two pages in their newspaper that didn’t look like they belonged there.

The pages, produced by the Financial Post (a part of the National Post), were inserted into The Gazette, and identical pages inserted into all 10 Canwest-owned daily newspapers, as well as the Winnipeg Free Press (the National Post is no longer available for home delivery in Winnipeg). They include comment pieces from Financial Post writers that appear in the same day’s Financial Post, and a markets summary page similar to what appears in the Post.

This latter page replaces the Saturday stock listings that had already been reduced from three pages to one. Among the latest cuts:

• Bond listings are deleted entirely
• NYSE and NASDAQ’s 100 most active stocks are deleted, leaving only the top 10 winners and losers
• The three main indexes list only the daily change, and no longer include volume, daily highs and lows, or 52-week highs and lows
• The TSX industry indexes are deleted
• The number of foreign currencies listed drops from 40 to 10
• Mutual fund listings are deleted entirely, though The Gazette says they will “return soon”

In order to fit these new pages in the continually-shrinking Saturday Business section, the amount of locally-produced content has shrunk from five pages to less than three.

The Montreal Newspaper Guild believes this is a gross assault on the independence of local newspapers that hasn’t been seen since Canwest attempted to institute a national editorial policy shortly after purchasing the newspaper chain. Not only that, but subscribers to both The Gazette and the National Post are treated to intentional duplication of content.

The Gazette has no control over the content of these pages. Gazette copy editors and managers are not permitted to alter their content in any way.

Gazette Vice-President of Marketing Bernard Asselin told CTV News this week that “The Gazette’s goal, which is the same as the union’s goal, is to protect local content.”

With this move, it seems clear that The Gazette’s goals are subject to veto by Canwest management.

Do you believe pages in your Gazette should be replaced with nationally-produced Financial Post content? Do you believe The Gazette should have control over its own pages? Sign our petition and tell Gazette and Canwest management that you will not tolerate the continued erosion of local news.

Can you spot the local content on these pages?

Ottawa Citizen

Starting today, the Citizen’s Business & Technology section brings you two pages of highlights from the Financial Post. Each day from Tuesday through Saturday, you’ll find the trusted business analysis, markets insights and personal finance information that make the Financial Post an indispensable source of business intelligence. We welcome your comments. Please send them to feedback@thecitizen.canwest.com

Vancouver Sun

We’re very pleased to introduce today two new pages of content from the Financial Post. … I am delighted that this high-quality content is now part of your Vancouver Sun reading experience.

Calgary Herald

Beginning today, Herald readers will benefit from a new partnership between Calgary Business and the Financial Post.

Edmonton Journal

Edmonton’s best source of local business news is getting a special value-added boost from Canada’s most trusted financial newspaper — the Financial Post.

Victoria Times-Colonist

Starting today, one of Canada’s most trusted sources of financial news will become a regular part of the Times Colonist Business section.

Windsor Star

Today’s Windsor Star introduces a new feature designed to make you a better money manager. Two pages of stories, columns, graphs and charts from the highly respected Financial Post will break down market activity and give you the latest advice from top experts. … We hope you enjoy this enhanced coverage, and invite you to give us your opinion by dropping a line to fp@thestar.canwest.com

Saskatoon StarPhoenix

Regina Leader-Post

Here’s our take on The Gazette’s television commercials. Please share it (on Facebook or in other ways). You can also sign our petition or show your support in other ways.